Google Highlighting US .com's in SERPS

So when did Google start labelling US .com's with "United States" next to the URL?



I've just seen it on this search. (must work on my SEO evidently)

How will it effect the CTR for those .com's? Or those that target all international markets with a .com but are located in one particular country?

A Stumble Down Memory Lane ... The View Is Still The Same

So for most of you this won't be the most relevant of posts I've ever made. But for some of you that occasionally look back at where you've come then it may be interesting.

Whilst on my way to check the location of a meeting I've got in the morning I realised that I'd beaten that path before. I used to walk that way to the Old Street Station when on my way home for providing Workthing.com with SEO consultancy.

It must have been about eight or nine years ago that I was last year - before the company went bump.

I started thinking about the strategies I was recommending. Then I realised they're pretty much no different than I recommend today.

Here's what I was suggesting to them:

1) Clear out the crap.
I suggested that they streamline the route from homepage to relevant content.

2) De-dupe
They used some microsites to target different recruitment niches, but they were too similar to each other. I tried to get them to create relevant content and use it on those sites (they already had great content on the main site)

3) Obtain more relevant links from industry authority sites to those microsites whilst trying to get more recruitment links to the main.

4) Focus more widely on relevant keywords and devise a format across sectors that will attract visitors that are more likely to convert.

5) Greater accountability of the data set and track goals more accurately.

6) Increase the likelihood that visitors would enthuse about the site and recommend it to others.

It's remarkable that these six objectives are still 100% relevant today. So has SEO changed in the last eight or nine years? My view is that it hasn't as much as people think.

To me SEO has always been about writing good content, content that focuses on your head terms, but extends into the tail. It's always been about getting good quality links. Even when I first started link building in late 1997 I always tried to get links from relevant sites. I never tried to get them from totally unrelated, but highly-valued (in general) sites. I've always tried to account for my SEO actions and gauge the success of everything I've done. So to me, the core principles of SEO have not changed during the past decade.

All that's changed is that you've got to work a hundred times harder because the competitive landscape is much tougher.

Here's to the next decade.

Playing Around With Easy Content Units & Wordpress To Mitigate Duplication

So I'm going to do a bigger post on the process of moving from Blogger to Wordpress and all the bits and bobs, stresses and headaches that go with it. But here's just a quick one for those people that block out category, tag and search pages due to the fear of duplication.

Well there's no need to!

What you can do is add content to these pages on a page by page basis. I want to show a unique head paragraph for specific category pages so that's what I've done on my Ganache and guest reviews category pages with the code within the archive.php template:

<?php if (is_category('guest-reviews')) { ?>

<p>The reviews below are from Guest Reviewers. Having just one reviewer may give a slanted perception of chocolate, so offering the site up to others to add their thoughts should give a more balanced scope of reviews.</p><p>Reviewers are chosen for their lack of bias or favouritism for a particular brand, but they may prefer certain types of chocolate so feel free to give them your feedback</p>

<?php } elseif (is_category('Ganaches')) { ?>

<p>Ganache is a smooth mixture of chocolate, cream, and butter. Generally, it is dipped in tempered chocolate and rolled in powdered cocoa, sweetener, or other coatings to create a truffle, though it is also frequently used as the centre of a bonbon. &raquo; Read more in the <a href="http://www.chocolatereviews.co.uk/chocolate-glossary/">Glossary</a>. &laquo;</p>

<?php } else { ?>

<p>Below you can see a list of reviews about <?php single_cat_title(); ?> - we hope you enjoy! </p>

<?php } ?>

It's not rocket science really. I'm crap at php but am learning the odd bit here and there. I've even started to put conditional EasyContentUnits in dependent in the category at the bottom - although I need to sort the formatting out. The code I used was similar:

<?php if (is_category('ganaches')) { ?>

[Your ECU php unit code]

<?php } else { ?>

<p>That's all for: <?php single_cat_title(); ?> - we hope you enjoy! </p>

<?php } ?>

I also use the excerpt option when posting to add a little snippet to appear in the search results (I block this) and meta description:

<h3><a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>" rel="bookmark" title="<?php the_title(); ?>"><?php the_title(); ?></a></h3>

<?php echo htmlentities(the_excerpt()); ?>

Now I'm working on changing the sidebar navigation dependent on what category the individual posts are in. Everything is possible if you put your mind to it.